My current research investigates the depositional and diagenetic history of Gale Crater, home to the Mars Curiosity Rover. By integrating analysis of the sedimentary, hydrology, burial, and compaction processes affecting the crater fill, I am constructing a big-picture model of the crater as a sedimentary basin.

Other aspects of my previous and ongoing research touch upon Europa fractures, morphology and depositional styles of alluvial fans on Earth and Mars, structural reconstruction of deformed sedimentary basins, and more.

As part of an effort to update lab materials for introductory courses, I developed and implemented a study on improvements in student learning when using an augmented reality sandbox in a Geology 101 topographic map lab, as compared to usage of traditional 2D maps. The resulting manuscript is currently under review with the Journal of Geoscience Education.

In addition to developing new course material and designing lab assignments, I have also been a lab instructor and guest lecturer for a range of undergraduate and graduate geology and planetary science courses.

I am currently a postdoc collaborator and SedStrat facilitator with the Mars Curiosity Rover Science Team and my ongoing postdoc research is based in Gale Crater and Curiosity data. I was also a grad student collaborator with the Opportunity Rover Science Team, primarily in the role of SOWG Documentarian, from 2017 through the end of mission operations.

In 2021 I participated in JPL’s Planetary Science Summer School, designing and proposing the Astrobiology eXploration at Enceladus (AXE) mission. A portion of my PhD research used THEMIS data and I was involved with the THEMIS Science Team as a graduate student researcher.